Chapter III: Part I: On the Battle-Ground

We--grandma, "our young folks," and I--live up here among the hills, in a quaint, old-fashioned farm-house,--older than any of the "old folks" now living; and every day, when the sun goes down, we gather around the great wood fire in the sitting-room, and talk and tell stories by the hour together. I tell the most of the stories; for, though I am only a plain farmer, going about in a slouched hat, a rusty coat, and a pair of pantaloons so old and threadbare that you would not wear them if you were in the ash business, I have mingled with men, seen a great many places, and been almost all over the world.

My own children like my stories, because they think they are true, and because they are all about the men I have met, and the places I have seen, and so give them some glimpses of what is going on in the busy life outside of our quiet country home; but I do not expect other young folks to like them as well as my own do,--for their own father will not tell them. However, I am going to write out a few of the many I know, in the hope that they may give some trifling pleasure and instruction to boys and girls I have never seen, and who gather of evenings around firesides far away from the one where all my stories are first told.

As I sit down to write by this bright, blazing fire, the clouds are scudding across the moon, and the wind is moaning around the old house, shaking the doors, and rattling the windows, and snapping the branches of the great trees as if a whole regiment of young giants were cracking their whips in the court-yard. On just such a night a wounded boy lay out on the Wilderness battle-ground!

You have heard of that great battle; how two hundred thousand men met in a dense forest, and for two long days and nights, over wooded hills, and through tangled valleys, and deep, rocky ravines, surged against each other like angry waves in a storm. And you have heard, too--what is very pitiful to hear--how, when that bloody storm was over, and the sun came out, dim and cold, on the cheerless May morning which followed, thirty thousand men--every one the father, brother, or friend of some young folks at home--lay dead and dying on that awful field. Amid such a host of dead and dying men, you might overlook one little boy, who, all that starless Friday night, lay there wounded in the Wilderness. I do not want you to overlook him, and therefore I am going to tell you his story.

He was a bright-eyed, fair-haired boy of twelve, the only son of his mother, who was a widow. He used to read at home of how little boys had gone to the war, how they had been in the great battles, and how great generals had praised them; and he longed to go to the war too, and to do something to make himself as famous as the little boy who fought on the Rappahannock. For a long time his mother was deaf to his entreaties,--and he would not go without her consent; but at last, when a friend of his father raised a company of hundred-days men in his native town, she let him join as a drummer-boy in the regiment.

The first battle he was in was the terrible one in the Wilderness. His regiment shared in the first day's fight, but he escaped unharmed; and all that night, though tired and hungry, he went about in the woods carrying water to the wounded. The next morning he snatched a few hours' sleep, and that and a good breakfast refreshed him greatly. At ten o'clock his regiment moved, and it kept moving and fighting all that day, until the sun went down; but, though a hundred of his comrades had fallen around him, he remained unhurt.

The shadows were deepening into darkness, and the night was hanging its lanterns up in the sky, when the weary men threw themselves on the ground to rest. Overcome with fatigue, he too lay down, and, giving one thought to his mother at home, and another to his Father in heaven, fell fast asleep. Suddenly the sharp rattle of musketry and the deafening roar of cannon sounded along the lines, and five thousand rebels rushed out upon them. Surprised and panic-stricken, our men broke and fled; and, roused by the terrible uproar, James--that was his name--sprang to his feet, but only in time to catch in his arms the captain, who was falling. He was shot through and through by a minie ball.

James laid him gently on the ground, took his head tenderly in his lap; and listened to the last words he had to send to his wife and children. Meanwhile, yelling like demons, the Rebels came on, and passed them. Then he could have escaped to the woods, but he would not leave his father's friend when he was dying.

Soon our men rallied, and in turn drove the enemy. Slowly and sullenly the Rebels fell back to the hill where James and his friend were lying. There they made a stand, and for half an hour fought desperately, but were at last overborne and forced back again. As they were on the eve of retreating, a tall, ragged ruffian came up to James, and demanded the watch and money of the captain.

"You will not rob a dying man?" said the little boy, looking up to him imploringly.

"Wall, I woan't!" was the Rebel's brutal reply, as he aimed his bayonet straight at the captain's heart.

By a quick, dexterous movement, James parried the blow; but, turning suddenly on the poor boy, the ruffian, with another thrust of his bayonet, ran him directly through the body. His head sunk back to the ground, and he fainted.

How long he lay there unconscious he does not know, but when he came to himself the moon had gone down, and the stars had disappeared, and thick, black clouds were filling all the sky. It did not rain, but the cold wind moaned among the trees, and chilled him through and through. He tried to rise, but a sharp pain came in his side, and for the first time he thought of his wound. Passing his hand to it, he found it was clotted with blood. The cold air had stopped the bleeding, and thus saved his life. Though the bayonet had gone clear through him, his hurt was not mortal, for no vital part was injured.

He thought of the captain, and spoke his name; but no answer came. Then he reached out his hand to find him. He was there, but his face was cold,--colder than the cold night that was about them. He was dead.

The wounded lay all around, and all this while their cries and groans, as they called piteously for water, or moaned aloud in their agony, came to his ear, and went to his very soul. He had heard their cries the night before, as he crept about among them in the thick woods; but then they had not sounded so sad, so pitiful, as now, and that night was not so cold, so dark, so cheerless as this was. Soon he knew the full extent of their agony. An intolerable thirst came upon him. Hot, melted lead seemed to run along his veins, and a burning heat, as of a fire of hot coals kindling in his side, almost consumed him. He cried out for help, but no help came,--for water, but still he thirsted. Then he prayed,--prayed to the Good Father, who he knew was looking pitifully down on him through the thick darkness, to come and help him.

And He came. He always comes to those who ask for Him. Soon the clouds grew darker, the wind rose higher, and the rain--the cooling, soothing, grateful rain--poured down in torrents. It wet him through and through, but it eased his pain, cooled the fever in his blood, and he slept! In all that cold and pelting storm he slept!

It was broad day when he awoke. The sun was shining dimly through the thick masses of gray clouds which floated in the sky, but the wind had gone down, and the rain was over. The moans of the wounded still came to him, but they were not so frequent, nor so terrible, as they were the night before. Many had found relief from the rain, and many had ceased moaning forever.

He could not rise, but, after long and painful effort, he succeeded in turning over on his side. Then he had a view of the scene around him. He lay near the summit of a gentle hill, at whose base a little brook was flowing. At the north it was crowned with a dense growth of oaks and pines and cedar thickets, but at the south and west it sloped away into waving meadows and pleasant cornfields, already green with the opening beauty of spring. Beyond the meadows were other hills, and knolls, and rocky heights, all covered with an almost impenetrable forest, and there the hardest fighting of those terrible days was done. A narrow road, bordered by a worm-fence (Western boys know what a worm-fence is), wound around the foot of the hill, and led to a large mansion standing half hidden in a grove of oaks and elms, not half a mile away. Before this mansion were pleasant lawns and gardens, and in its rear a score or more of little negro houses, whose whitewashed walls were gleaming in the sun. This was the plantation--so James afterwards learned--of Major Lucy, one of those wicked men whose bad ambition has brought this dreadful war on our country.

The scene was very beautiful, and, looking at it, James forgot for a moment the darker picture, drawn in blood, on the grass around him. But there it was. Blackened muskets, broken saddles, overturned caissons, wounded horses snorting in agony, and fair-haired boys and gray-haired men mangled and bleeding,--some piled in heaps, and some stretched out singly to die,--lay all over that green hillside! Here and there a crippled soldier was creeping about among the wounded, and, close by, a stalwart man, the blood dripping from his dangling sleeve, was wrapping a blue-eyed, pale-faced boy in his blanket. "Don't cry, Freddy," he said; "ye sha'n't be cold! Yer mother'll soon be yere!" But the boy gave no answer, for--he was dead!

"He don't hear you," said James. "He isn't cold now!"

"I'se afeard he ar',--he said he war. Oh! ef his mother know'd he war yere! 't would break her heart,--break her heart!" moaned the man, still wrapping the blanket about the boy.

James closed his eyes to shut out the painful scene, and the thought of his own mother came to him. Would it not break _her_ heart to know he was wounded? to hear, perhaps, that he was dead? He must not die; for her sake, he must not die! ONE only could help him, and so he prayed. Again he prayed that the Good Father would come to him, and again the Good Father came!

"What is _ye_ a doin' yere, honey,--a little one loike ye?" asked a kind voice at his side.

He looked up. It was an old black woman, dressed in a faded woollen gown, a red and yellow turban, and a pair of flesh-colored stockings which Nature herself had given her. She was very short, almost as broad as she was long, and had a face as large round as the moon,--and it looked very much like the moon when it shines through a black cloud; for, though darker than midnight, it was all over light,--that kind of light which shines through the faces of good people.

"I am wounded; I want water," said the little boy, feebly.

"Ye shill hab it, honey," said the woman, giving him some from a bucket she had set on the ground.

"Guv some ter _my_ lad," cried the man who sat by the dead boy; "he's been a cryin' fur it all night--all night! Didn't ye yere him?"

"No, I didn't, massa. I hain't been yere more'n a hour, and a tousand's a heap fur one ole ooman ter 'tend on," she replied, filling a gourd from the bucket, and going with it to the dead boy.

She stooped down and held the water to his lips, but in a moment started back, and cried out in a frightened way,--"He'm dead! _He_ can't drink no more!"

"He hain't dead!" yelled the man, fiercely; "he sha'n't die! Guv _me_ the water, ole 'ooman."

With a trembling hand, he tried to give it to his son. He held it to the boy's lips for a moment, then, dropping the gourd, and sinking to the ground, he cried out,--"It'll kill his mother,--kill his mother! Oh! oh!"

"He'm better off, massa," said the woman, in a voice full of pity; "he'm whar he kin drink foreber ob de bery water ob life."

"Gwo away, ole 'ooman,--gwo away,--doan't speak ter me!" moaned the man, throwing his arms around the body of his boy, and burying his face in the blanket he had wrapped about him.

Brushing her tears away with her apron, the woman turned to James, and said,--"Whar is ye hurted, honey? Leff aunty see."

The little boy opened his jacket, and showed her his side. She could not see the wound, for the blood had glued his shirt, and even his waistcoat, to his body; but she said, kindly,--"Don't fret, honey. 'Tain't nuffin ter hurt,--it'll soon be well. Ole Katy'll borrer a blanket or so frum some o' dese as is done dead, and git ye warm; and den, when she's gub'n a little more water ter de firsty ones, she'll take a keer ob you,--she will, honey; so neber you f'ar."

She went away, but soon came again with the blankets, and, wrapping two about him, and putting another under his head, said,--"Dar, honey, now you'll be warm; and neber you keer ef ole Katy hab borrer'd de blankets. Dey'll neber want 'em darselfs; and she knows it'll do dar bery souls good, eben whar dey is, ter know _you's_ got 'em. So neber keer, and gwo ter sleep,--dat's a good chile. Aunty'll be yere agin in a jiffin."

James thanked the good woman, and, closing his eyes again, soon fell asleep. The sun was right over his head, when old Katy awoke him, and said,--"Now, honey, Aunty's ready now. She'll tote you off ter de plantation, and hab you all well in less nur no time, she will; fur massa's 'way, and dar haint no 'un dar now ter say she sha'n't."

"You can't carry me; I'm too heavy, Aunty," said James, making a faint effort to smile.

"Carry you! Why, honey chile, ole Katy could tote a big man, forty times so heaby as you is, ef dey was only a hurted so bad as you."

Taking him up, then, as if he had been a bag of feathers, she laid his head over her shoulder, and, cuddling him close to her bosom, carried him off to the large mansion he had seen in the distance.

What befell him there I shall tell "our young folks" in the next number of this, their own Magazine.

_Edmund Kirke._

THOMAS HUGHES.

The portrait given with the present number of "Our Young Folks" is that of one of England's cleverest writers and best men,--Thomas Hughes. Mr. Hughes is well known throughout all America as the author of those most spirited and truthful books, "School Days at Rugby," and "Tom Brown at Oxford,"--books which all young people, girls as well as boys, ought to read, and which their elders cannot fail to find delightful and profitable. Another volume, "The Scouring of the White Horse," has also been republished in this country, but as its interest is quite local,--the scene being laid in the county of Kent, England, and the principal incidents relating to a festival which took place there,--it has not been so extensively circulated.

Mr. Hughes is the second son of John Hughes, Esq., of Donington Priory, near Newbury, Berks Co., England. He was born October 20, 1823, and received his early education at Rugby under the instruction of the noble Dr. Arnold, who is depicted so beautifully in "School Days at Rugby." In 1841 he entered Oriel College, Oxford, and received his degree of B. A. in 1845. He immediately registered himself as a student at Lincoln's Inn, and was called to the bar in January, 1848.

Mr. Hughes still pursues the profession of a barrister, in which he stands prominent, and devotes much of his time to the writing and doing of good things. He has been a strong helper in plans for the education and assistance of workmen in his own country, and has always advocated the principles of liberty and justice everywhere. He is one of the truest friends that the United States has in England, and his voice and his pen have never failed to support her cause against that of Rebeldom.

PHYSICAL HEALTH.

TO THE YOUNG PEOPLE OF AMERICA.

The great war will end. Then what magnificent expansion! But what immense responsibilities! Soon they must rest upon you,--your manhood and womanhood. God and the nations will watch you.

A great and good nation is made up of great and good men and women. A strong building cannot be made of weak timbers.

A complete man is composed of a healthy body, a cultured brain, and a true heart. Wanting either he fails. Is his heart false? His strong head and body become instruments of evil. Is his head weak? His strong body and true heart are cheated. Is the body sick? His noble head and heart are like a great engine in a rickety boat.

_Our Young Folks are strong and good._

I have studied the life of the young among the better peoples of Europe. It is not flattery to say, that you, my young fellow-countrymen, have the best heads and hearts in the world. The great size of your brains is noticed by every intelligent stranger. The ceaseless activity of those brains is one of the most striking features of American life. American growth, as seen in railways, telegraphs, and agriculture, is tame and slow when compared with the achievements of our schools. And where else among the young are there such organizations for the spread of the Gospel, for temperance, for the relief of the sick and wounded?

_But our Young Folks are weak._

Your weakness is in your bodies. Here lies your danger. I see nothing which distresses me so much as the physique of the children in our public schools. Great heads, beautiful faces, brilliant eyes; but with that attenuated neck, thin, flat chest, and languid gait. Look at these two boys, John and Thomas. John is a native Yankee. I found him, without long searching, in one of our public schools. Thomas is an imaginary boy, composed by the artist.

_Causes of John's Deformity._

He has lain several hours every night in the position seen in Fig. 3. Much of that ugly pushing forward of the head among girls is produced by thick pillows.

Young people should sleep on hair pillows two inches thick. Ambitious girls and boys throw the pillow aside. This is the other extreme, and wrong. It is unhealthy to lie constantly on the back. You must frequently change to the side. But when you turn upon the side, if you have no pillow, you must either twist the shoulders into a mischievous attitude, or let the head fall down to the level of the shoulder, as seen in Fig. 4. This disturbs the circulation in the neck.

_False Positions while sitting._

Another cause of the bad shape of John's spine we find in his bad positions while sitting. Fig. 5 represents the position in which he should sit. You observe his feet rest on the floor. His hips are against the back of the chair. His spine is erect. In this position he may sit two hours without fatigue, provided the chair be a good one. About chairs I shall presently say something.

Fig. 6 shows a position in which I often see John. Do you observe how, _with his legs crossed_, he must push forward on the seat? The small of the back is no longer supported. The strain will soon produce weakness and pain.

Fig. 7 represents a still worse position. The strain upon the small of the back must not only produce weakness there, but must soon incline the spine to bend backward, while its natural shape at that point is a beautiful curve forward.

Writers on manners say the positions seen in Figs. 6 and 7 are vulgar. In this case, as in most others, propriety and physiology are in harmony.

_Positions in School._

Fig. 8 shows a bad posture. Sitting thus three hours a day must soon produce round shoulders. Various devices have been proposed to help the pupil out of this difficulty. Our booksellers furnish a simple rack, which is shown in Fig. 9. It holds one or two books. In Fig. 10 two books are seen resting upon it. Fig. 11 shows the position of the pupil while using the book-rack. An eminent professor in a New-England college said to the assembled students, the other day, "This book-holder will add years to a literary man's life."

_Chairs._

I promised a word about chairs. Our manufacturers do not consider health in designing the shape of chairs. The seats are too high, and too nearly horizontal. Boys and girls occupy seats seventeen inches high. A girl twelve years old should have a chair with the seat not more than twelve inches high. For a man even, it should not be more than fifteen or sixteen inches. (These dimensions apply to the front of the seat.) The back part should be at least two inches lower. With this inclination, the sitter will slide backward, against the back of the chair, instead of sliding forward, as he generally does. This sliding forward produces a strain upon the small of the back, and is, in fact, the cause of most of the fatigue in sitting. The width of the chair-seat from front to back should be the same as the height in front.

The chair-_back_ should project farthest forward at that point which corresponds to the small of the back. Instead of this, there is generally at that point a hollow. This error is the cause of much pain and weakness in the lower part of the spine.

Fig. 12 shows an unphysiological chair. It is a fashionable parlor-chair. Fig. 13 is a physiological chair. Two hours in this will fatigue less than half an hour in that.

_Walking._

Americans are bad walkers. It is rare to find an exception, even in our army. Among Europeans, and the aborigines of our own continent, a noble mien is not uncommon. I understand the causes of this ugly defect, among our people, but my present purpose is simply to call attention to it, and to point out the remedy.

In English and French books on the military drill and physical training, whole chapters discuss the subject of walking. We are told that this or that part of the foot must touch the ground first,--that the angles must be so and so, &c., &c. I will not say this advice is not right, but I will say that very few have been helped by it.

Look at a good walker. Shoulders, head, and hips drawn well back, and the chest thrown forward. What a firm, vigorous tread! Such a walk may easily be secured by carrying a weight upon the head. An iron crown has been devised for this purpose. It consists of three crowns, one within the other, each weighing about nine pounds. One or all three may be worn at a time.

The water-carriers of Southern Europe, although belonging to the lowest class, have a noble bearing. Certain negroes in the South, who "tote" burdens upon the head as a business, can be readily pointed out in a crowd. The effort required to keep the burden directly over the spine so develops the muscles of the back and neck, that in the absence of the burden the head is carried in a noble, erect attitude.

By carrying one of these crowns upon the head half an hour two or three times a day, while walking in the garden or through the halls of the house, one may soon become a fine walker. One tenth of the time occupied in learning a few tunes on the piano, given to this exercise, would insure any girl a noble carriage. The crown is not necessary. Any weight which does not press upon the very crown of the head, but _about_ it, will answer the purpose equally well.

Fig. 14 exhibits John as the photographer took him the first time he wore the crown. You observe how his form is changed.

_False Positions while walking, in Schools._

Fig. 15 shows the worst of them. This is no exaggeration of what I have seen in our New-England schools. It is not common among scholars to join the hands thus, and carry the body erect. Fig. 16 shows a still worse position. If you stand erect, with your arms hanging by the sides, and then deliberately fold the arms, as in this figure, you will find the points of the shoulders are drawn forward two inches, and the chest much contracted. Experiments prove that the amount of air which the lungs can inhale is reduced fifteen to eighteen per cent when the arms are thus folded.

Fig. 17 secures a good position of the spine, and opens the chest. Fig. 18 is not very seemly, but, practised five minutes two or three times a day, would do much to develop the muscles of the spine, and particularly those of the back of the neck, whose weakness permits the head to droop. This subject I commend to teachers and school-committees.

_The Muff._

It draws the shoulders forward, and produces an ugly gait. Let a boy wear a shawl, and hold it together in front with his hands, and he will have the same disagreeable waddle. If he wears it even for one winter, he will learn to stoop. Muffs, shawls, and those cloaks which do not allow the arms to swing freely, should all be thrown overboard. Over-coats should be worn by both sexes.

The arms are almost as necessary in walking as the legs. The first time you are walking with your arms at liberty, stop moving them and hold them by your sides. You will be surprised to find how soon your companion will leave you behind, although you may hurry, twist, wriggle, and try very hard to keep up. One reason for the slow walk among girls is to be found in this practice of carrying the arms motionless. Three miles an hour with the arms still, is as hard work as four miles with the arms free.

I have seen the queens of the stage walk. I have seen a few girls and women of queenly bearing walk in the street and drawing-room. They moved their arms in a free and graceful manner. Could this habit become universal among girls, their chests would enlarge and their bearing be greatly improved. See that girl walking with both hands in her muff. How she wriggles and twists her shoulders and hips! This is because her arms are pinioned. Give _them_ free swing, and her gait would soon become more graceful.

You have seen pictures of our muscles. Those of the upper part of the body, you remember, spread out from the shoulder, in all directions, like a fan. Now if you hold the shoulder still, the muscles of the chest will shrink, the shoulders stoop, and the whole chest become thin and ugly.

But some girls will say, "Swinging the arms must be very _slight_ exercise." True, it is very slight, if you swing the arms but once or ten times, but if you swing them ten thousand times in a day, you will obtain more exercise of the muscles of the chest than by all other ordinary movements combined. Indeed, if I were asked what exercise I thought most effective for developing the chests of American girls, I should reply at once, _swinging the arms while walking_.

_Dio Lewis._

ANDY'S ADVENTURES;

OR THE WORLD BEWITCHED.

Andy's folks had gone to town, and left him at home to take care of the house, watch the garden, and amuse himself.

Andy had a new bow and arrow, and he thought it would be great sport to have nothing to do all the afternoon but to shoot at the robins and woodpeckers.

So, as soon as the wagon was out of sight, and the gate shut, he ran into the orchard, and began the fun. He kept near enough to the house to see if anybody came to the door, and near enough to the garden to see if the pigs got into it; and whenever he saw a bird, he sent an arrow after it. But the robins soon found out what he wanted, and flew away when they saw him coming. Their beautiful red breasts would have been capital marks, if they had only waited for him to get a good shot. The wrens were not afraid, but they were so small he could not hit them. And the swallows kept flying about so, twittering and darting here and there, that he knew he would have to practise a long time before he could take them on the wing. The yellow-birds and blue-birds were so shy, that he could hardly see one in sight of the house. So there was no game left but the woodpeckers.

But woodpeckers are cunning fellows. They run up the trees, and stick in their bills, and hop about, and fly from one tree to another so fast, that it takes a pretty smart boy to hit one. They were tame enough, and would sometimes let Andy come quite near; they would stop pecking a moment, and hold up their red heads to take a good look at him; then they would begin to drum again in the merriest way, making little holes in the old peach-trees, which began to look like wooden soldiers that had gone through the wars and been shot in hundreds of places. But the instant Andy drew the bowstring and took aim, they knew well enough what it meant; and it was provoking to see them dodge around on the bark and get out of sight just in time to let the arrow whiz by them. Then they would go to pecking and drumming again so near, that he wished a dozen times that he had some kind of an arrow that would shoot around a tree and hit on the other side.

At length Andy grew tired of this fun; and he had lost his arrow so many times in the grass, and had to hunt for it, that he got vexed, and thought it would be much better sport to go and shoot a chicken.

Now he did not mean to kill a chicken, and he did not really think he would be able to hit one. But often we do things more easily when we are not trying very hard, than when we are too anxious. So it happened with Andy. He tried his luck on the speckled top-knot, which everybody considered the handsomest chick that had been hatched that summer. He drew his bow, let go the string, and the speckled top-knot keeled over. He ran up to it, very proud, at first, of his good shot, but frightened enough when he found that the chicken only just kicked a little, and then lay quite still.

Andy turned it over, and tried to stand it upon its legs, and thought what he should tell his parents.

"I'll say a hawk flew down and killed it! But I shot at the hawk, and he let it drop, just as he was flying away with it."

This was the story he made up, as he took poor top-knot and laid it down by the well-curb.

He was still wishing to shoot something that was alive, and, seeing the cat creeping along on the fence watching for a mouse, he concluded to try his luck with her. So he drew up, aimed, and fired. Puss was so intent on watching the mouse that she paid no attention at all to the arrow, which struck the rail a little behind her, and glanced off towards the house. Andy heard a sound like shivered glass, and, running up, saw to his dismay that he had broken a window.

Now he had been told never to shoot his arrow towards the house; and how to conceal the accident and avoid punishment he couldn't at first imagine. The glass lay scattered on the pantry shelf, and the hole in the pane was large enough to put his hand through.

"I'll say Joe Beals came and wanted my bow, and because I wouldn't let him have it, he threw a stone at me, and broke the window."

And having made up this story, he searched for such a stone as Joe would be apt to throw, and, having found one, placed it on the pantry floor, to appear as if it had fallen there after passing through the glass.

These accidents made him dislike his bow, and he hung it up in the wood-shed. Then he made a lasso of a string, and caught the cat by throwing the noose over her head. But Puss did not like the sport as well as he did, and gave him such a scratch that he was glad to let her run off with the lasso. Then he thought he would plague the old sow by getting one of her little pink-white pigs; but the instant he had caught it up in his arms, it began to squeal; and the mother, hearing it, ran after him with such a frightful noise, throwing up her great, savage tusks at him, that he dropped it, and ran for his life. She stopped to smell of Piggy, and see if it was hurt; and so he got away, though he was terribly frightened.

Then Andy thought of his toy ship; and having stopped the holes in the sink, and pumped it full of water, he called it his ocean, and launched the "Sea-bird." With a pair of bellows he made wind, and with a dipper he made waves; and by placing a kettle bottom upwards in the middle of the sink he made an island; and the good ship pitched, and tossed, and rolled in a very exciting manner. At length he resolved to have a shipwreck. This he managed, not by putting the ship on a rock, but by putting a rock on the ship. He used for the purpose the stone Joe Beals did not throw through the pantry window, and the "Sea-bird" went down, with all her crew on board. He then opened the holes in the sink, and the tide, going out, left the vessel on her beam-ends, stranded.

It would have been well for Andy if he had been contented with such innocent pastimes, without doing mischief to the cat, or chickens, or pigs, or trying to shoot the pretty birds that fly about the orchards, singing so sweetly, and eating the worms that destroy the trees.

But nothing satisfied him; and to have some better fun than any yet, he determined to stand in the door and scream, "Fire!" He could not imagine greater sport than to see the neighbors come running to put out the fire, and then laugh at them for being duped. He did not consider that they would have to leave their work, and run a long distance, till they were quite out of breath; or that his laughter would be a very mean and foolish return for the good-will they would show in hastening to save his father's house; or that, in case the house should really take fire some day, and he should call for help, people might think it another silly trick, and stay away.

He stood in the door, filled his lungs with a long breath, opened his mouth as wide as he could, and screamed,--"Fire! fire! fire!"

Three times. He thought it so funny, that he had to stop and laugh. Then he took another breath, and screamed again, louder than before,--"Fire! fire! fire! fire! fire!"

Five times; and he heard the echoes away off among the hills; and, looking across the lot, he saw old Mother Quirk hobbling on her crutch.

Old Mother Quirk was just about the queerest woman in the world. She had a nose as crooked as a horn, and almost as long. It crooked down to meet her chin, and her chin crooked up to meet her nose. And some people said she could hold the end of a thread between them, when she wished to twist a cord with both hands,--although I doubt it. Her face was so full of wrinkles, that the smallest spot you could think of had at least twenty in it. Her eyes were as black as charcoal, and as bright as diamonds. She was very old; and her back was bent like a bow; and her hair was perfectly white, and as long and fine as the finest kind of flax; and she was so lame that she could never walk without her crutch.

She was a good woman though, people said, and knew almost everything. She could tell when it would rain to-morrow, and when it would be fair. She would shut her eyes, and tell you all about your friends at a distance; describe them as plainly as if she saw them, and inform you if anything pleasant or unpleasant had happened to them. She knew more about curing the sick than the doctors did; and once when Andy had hurt his foot by jumping upon a sharp stub, and it was so sore for a week that he could not step, and it had been poulticed and plastered till it was as white and soft as cheese-curd, Mother Quirk had cured it in three days, by putting on to it a bit of dried beef's gall, which drew out a sliver that the doctors had never thought of. She was always ready to help people who were in trouble; and now, when Andy screamed fire, she was the first to come hobbling on her crutch.

"What is burning, Andy?" she cried, as she came through the gate. "Where is the fire?"

"In the bottom of the well!" replied Andy, laughing till his side ached. "O, ho, ho! why don't you bring some water in a thimble, and put the well out? O, ho, ho! Mother Quirk!"

There was fire in the old woman's eyes just then, if not in the well. It flashed out of them like two little streams of lightning out of two little jet-black clouds. She lifted her crutch, and I am not sure but she would have struck Andy with it, if she had not been too lame to catch him.

"Put the well out, ho, ho, ho!" laughed Andy, hopping away.

"I would put you in, if I could get hold of you!" said Mother Quirk, shaking her crutch at him. "You wouldn't be dancing around so on that foot of yours, if I hadn't cured it for you, and this is the thanks I get for it!"

That made Andy feel rather ashamed; for he began to see how ungrateful it was in him to play the old woman such a trick.

"It isn't the first time you've made me run for nothing, with my poor old crutch," she went on, as he stopped laughing. "The other day you told me your mother was sick abed, and wanted to see me; and I left everything and hobbled over here; and didn't I find her ironing clothes in the kitchen, as well a woman as she ever was in her life, you little rogue!"

Andy laughed again at the recollection. "You was smoking your pipe," said he, "with your old black cat in your lap, and 't was fun to see you jump up and catch your crutch!"

"Fun to you! but do you think of my poor old bones? I'm almost a hundred years old," said Mother Quirk; "and shall I tell you what I've learnt all this time? I've learnt that the meanest thing in the world is to treat ill those who treat you kindly; and that the worst thing is lying."

Andy was sobered again, and the old woman continued:--

"What if everybody and everything should lie? What if we could never know when to believe what our friends and neighbors tell us? What if my crutch should lie, and, when I lean on it, break and let me fall?"

"I think it would be fun!" said Andy.

"And what if the ground you stand on should not be the ground it appears to be, but a great pit, and should let you fall into it when you think you are walking on the grass? Suppose that everything was a lie, that nothing was what it pretends to be, that the whole world should trick and cheat us?" cried the old woman, raising her voice.

"I should like to see the spot!" said Andy, giggling again.

"Should you?" almost shrieked the old woman, with a terrible look.

"Yes!" and Andy grinned at a safe distance.

"Then try it!" exclaimed Mother Quirk.

And holding her crutch under her shoulder, she brought her hands together with a loud slap. Although Andy was at least three yards off, it seemed to him exactly as if she had boxed his ear. He was almost knocked down, and his head hummed like a beehive; but he could not, to save his life, tell which ear had been boxed, nor which he ought to rub. For a minute, he kept whirling around, as dizzy as a top. Then a voice cried, "Catch that rabbit!"

_J. T. Trowbridge._

(_To be continued._)

WINNING HIS WAY.